ISTANBUL, Turkey — Turkish President
Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Tuesday warned
Russia against invading
Ukraine, calling
the former Soviet republic a "powerful" country with international
friends.
اضافة اعلان
Turkey's supply of combat drones to Ukraine
has drawn the wrath of Russia, which fears they could be used by Kyiv in its
years-long conflict in two regions of the Moscow-backed separatist east.
Speaking to Turkish reporters in Albania,
Erdogan said he intended to discuss the rising tensions with Russian President
Vladimir Putin.
"You cannot handle these things by
saying 'I will invade something, I will take it'," Turkish media quoted
Erdogan as saying.
"I don't see Russia's invasion of
Ukraine as a realistic option because it is not an ordinary country. Ukraine is
a powerful country," said Erdogan, who backs Ukraine's
NATO aspirations.
In December, Putin criticized Ukraine for
deploying Turkish attack drones, urging
Ankara to put pressure on Kyiv not to
use the military hardware, which has played a key role in conflicts in Libya
and over Azerbaijan's separatist region of Nagorno-Karabakh.
Turkey has countered by saying it cannot be
held responsible for how the drones are used by countries after they are sold.
Erdogan said he has always opposed Russia's
approach to Ukraine, criticizing its 2014 annexation of Crimea.
He added that Russia "should review the
state of affairs in the world and its own state of affairs before deciding to
take this step" to invade.
"We need to rip war out of political
history," Erdogan said.
The West accuses Russia of deploying tanks,
artillery and about 100,000 soldiers across Ukraine's northern and eastern
borders in preparation for a possible invasion.
Moscow says it is responding to what it sees
as the growing presence of NATO in its sphere of influence, where it fiercely
opposes the expansion of the Atlantic alliance.
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